The night seemed to hold its breath.
The forest clearing, bathed in moonlight, transformed into a dueling ground. The air grew denser, as if the very fibers of the world tightened in anticipation of the clash. The leaves ceased their whispers, and even the dust floating above the soil seemed frozen in time, expectant.
Daru stepped forward with the calm of one who knows every heartbeat of battle. Jay watched from his corner, pressed against the trunk, feeling as though his own heart was beating in slow motion. He couldn't believe it: the brother who once shared empanadas and silly afternoons now wielded two katanas. A dark gleam crawled along the blade as it was unsheathed, a cold aura clinging to the blood of the moon. Daru spoke no further; his name had already cut through the silence. Prag, the hunter, revealed himself in his stance—not as a textbook hero, but as someone hardened by necessity.
The shadow did not wait for courtesies. Its hands, thin and elongated like dead branches, clenched in a gesture, and from them sprouted points of darkness: shadow spears vibrating in the air like black insects. No words—only the dry noise of darkness splitting silence—and the duel began.
Daru advanced. Not with flourish or dance; each step was a hammer preparing to strike, not to sway. His katanas were extensions of his intent. His whole body moved with each arc: shoulder, hip, leg, all participating in the cut. He used no magic, no fire, no blessings. His strikes were pure physics, pure experience. The first thrust was a diagonal slash toward the spirit's chest.
The shadow spear responded, rising in an arc from the right to intercept. They collided. Metal against void: the sound was hollow, yet vibrations coursed through the ground and Jay's back. The spear's tip cracked and dissolved into a rain of black motes scattering across the clearing like nocturnal insects. Daru rolled to the side, already regaining position, his eyes alight, muscles taut like bowstrings.
The spirit struck without pause. Five spears burst in a fan, aimed at flanks, neck, and legs. A rain of dark filaments seeking to anchor flesh and will. Daru, unshaken, crossed his katanas in a parry that flashed; the blade scraped shadow, the sound like metal against slate glass. For an instant, the mist surrounding the spirit tightened, releasing a groan as if in pain, but the being did not retreat.
Jay saw blood pulse at Daru's wrist, the curve of a muscle, the exact way he pressed his lips before launching the next attack. It was beauty and brutality: a low diagonal meant to sever the spirit's legs. The shadow split into fragments, dodging with a motion not of flesh but of pure intent, and countered with a crescent slash toward Daru's face.
The clash of real steel against projected darkness produced sparks like tiny stars refusing to fall. Each parry from Daru disintegrated the attacking tip into a rain of black ash; each surprise strike from the shadow was met with a stance forged from sleepless nights, blows endured, survival earned.
The fight was no exchange of arrogance. It was a fierce dialogue. Each move from the spirit sought to test a limit, probe a weakness; each response from Daru sealed the opening with cold blood. At one moment, the shadow hurled a spear straight, lightning-fast, aimed at the human's heart. Jay felt the impact in his own body, as if the tip had pierced him: the spear nearly grazed Daru's shirt; the man adjusted, tightened his abdomen, and absorbed the blow with his thigh, leaving only a thick echo of pain. Not a deep wound, but a warning not to trust too much.
Daru breathed short, deep, and with a speed Jay would never have attributed to him, he bent, gathered momentum, and unleashed both katanas in a horizontal sweep that tore the air. A raw strike, designed to dismember intent. The left blade sought the shadow's neck; the right, its side. The spirit fragmented, multiplied its white eyes for a second, and its laughter turned into a metallic scream. Yet its body recoiled, became dark rain, and the katanas cut nothing but opaque wind. Still, the strike shattered the air around them into veins of moonlight.
Each impact left traces: not marks on real flesh, but scars in the atmosphere that closed like seams. Jay noticed that after each clash, the shadow breathed uneasily, as if physical aggression drained it; its laughter, once constant, grew hoarse, fractured. Daru, meanwhile, sweated; drops clung to his forehead and slid down his cheeks, but he did not slow. His movements grew harder, sharper. No tricks, no invocations; pure technique was his final weapon.
The dark beast did not limit itself to spears. Sometimes it dissolved, returning as smoke that tried to coil around Daru's waist; other times it projected thin blades intercepted before touching skin by the incisive edge of a katana cutting the void. At another moment, the spirit dropped a shadow onto the ground, rising like a tongue of earth seeking to tear the hunter's feet away. Daru leapt back with a force that cracked the soil, and with a turn, positioned his blade at the enemy's throat. By ancestral duty, the human kept calm: tilted his head, spoke with a dry, short voice—not to converse, but to break rhythm—and with a flick of his wrist slid the blade like turning the page of a book he refused to read.
Jay watched every detail with a mix of awe and terror. His eyes traced the precision of the cuts, Daru's almost detached expression, and the way the shadow returned again and again to its initial form, never defeated, always renewed. There was no uneven exchange favoring one side: the shadow rebounded against brute force and multiplied; brute force cut and widened the ether's wounds. It was a duel of swordsmen on two planes: one of flesh and steel; the other of essence and horror.
Midway through the fight, Daru did something that stole Jay's breath. Instead of pursuing destruction, he lowered his guard for an instant, feigning weakness to lure the foe. The shadow, cruel and impatient, attacked with a barrage of dark needles. Daru seemed to fall into the trap: he took the hit on his arm and let out a sound—not a lament, more an "ah," as if measuring his own pain. Then, with that same wounded hand, he drove the blade into the ground with force, using the weapon's impact as leverage to propel himself into a tremendous rotational maneuver that deflected the assault and unleashed the fiercest counter Jay had ever seen: a succession of cuts sweeping the area like harvesting wheat. The shadow retreated, not from flesh wounds, but because part of its ethereal structure had been sliced into strands lost in the air.
With each round, the two combatants traded advantage and burden. The colors of the scene shifted: the shadow's darkness; the katana's cutting gleam; the spirit's white eyes; Daru's hot red breath. The clearing was a board, and the blows, pieces moving with precision.
For Jay, the sensation was overwhelming: he did not cry; he did not scream; he did not move. He observed. He learned. Something inside him awakened: a mix of pride and fear, as if his blood whispered that this man was his blood—even if now that blood was tempered by the logic of combat.
The duel lasted what felt like eternal minutes, alternating assaults, parries, showers of ash, and reflections. There was an almost ritual moment, when Daru bent a knee, lowered his katana like cutting the rope of a snare, and the shadow emitted a vibration that seemed to break something within. A final, cracked laugh, and the creature dispersed like mist into the treetops. It was not a flight; it was a controlled dispersal. The shadow did not die. It retreated, regaining integrity at a distance, like one who withdraws to reset the jaw before biting again.
Daru stood in the center of the clearing, his breath weighing heavy in the air, his two katanas gripped with a mix of respect and exhaustion. He showed no euphoria. No complacency. Only a fixed gaze, like one who knows the danger is not over, but has won a round.
Jay, from his corner, felt his knees weaken. He had witnessed something that shattered his childish image of the world: his brother was not the boy from home, but a man forged by struggle. With no grave wounds on either side, the clearing remained tense, vibrating like a taut string not yet released.
The battle, for now, ended in a draw. Strength against essence; blade against shadow. Neither had been mortally wounded; neither had triumphed. Only a new, unspoken pact remained: the encounter had manifested, and the story—for Jay and for Daru—was only beginning.
Jay remained still, his heart beating at a rhythm almost impossible to measure. He calculated that barely two minutes had passed since Daru had spoken and relaxed, but those two minutes had been enough to leave him breathless. His older brother—though only two months older—seemed like another person. Strong, agile, brave… and yet still the same as always.
Jay didn't know what to think, or what to say. His human brother, an Earthling, stood before his eyes wielding two katanas with impressive skill. The strength he radiated, the speed of his movements, the certainty in his stance… Jay could hardly comprehend it. He only thought: "Will I ever be like him? No… better yet, could I surpass him?"
Daru, with a relaxed expression and a mocking tone, spoke: "Bua… good thing it left. With you here I couldn't give it my all. I could barely move without hurting you."
Hearing that, Jay was stunned. For an instant he wondered: "Was he not fighting seriously?" The idea that his brother had held back his true power filled him with a mix of awe and respect.
Slowly, Jay rose. This time not panting, not showing fatigue, but with his back straight, chest lifted, and conviction running through him from head to toe. He advanced toward his brother with firm steps, with the determination born only from surviving a savage world full of monsters and death.
But then, in mere milliseconds, something changed.
A pair of white eyes appeared behind Jay, floating in the darkness of the clearing. A shadow began to materialize—twisted, black, emanating an aura that made the air around feel heavier, colder. The spirit of unrest had returned. Its distorted, grotesque, hollow laughter shattered the silence of the forest, as if everything vibrated with its presence.
Daru reacted instantly. His face tightened, brow furrowed, muscles firm. He launched himself toward Jay at full speed, moving like a shadow under the moonlight, his katanas ready to protect. But Jay still didn't know. He was only a few meters away, unaware of the threat behind his back.
Then Jay saw Daru move, his face marked by worry, his hand raised in warning: "Careful!" It was enough for Jay to turn his head just in time.
The spirit was there, behind him, only an arm's length away. Its hollow white eyes glowed like ghostly lanterns, and in a swift motion it conjured a blade of shadow that sliced through the air, grazing Jay's back and leaving a clean, deep cut.
The pain was immediate and excruciating. Jay felt his blood surge, hot and abundant, soaking his clothes and spilling onto the ground like a red river among the forest leaves. He fell slowly, muscles tense, unable to hold his body upright. The scene was almost unbearable to witness: the moon illuminating the blood, the shadow of the spirit, and Daru's figure sprinting toward him.
In seconds, Daru was before Jay, his body wrapped in the shadow emanating from his katana, ready for a final strike. His expression was pure rage, determination, and merciless resolve. Every muscle in his face and body spoke of a single goal: to protect his brother at all costs.
But just as the katana was about to strike, the shadow dissolved. The spirit vanished in a blink, leaving Jay bleeding on the ground and Daru standing, breathing heavily, his katana still gleaming under the moonlight.
The moment passed so quickly it felt like a fragment of nightmare. The clearing, the leaves, the wind, the air heavy with tension… all was calm again. Yet Jay's heart still pounded fiercely, his blood still warm on his back, and his brother's presence radiated strength, protection, and an aura that made him feel safer than ever.
Jay remained there, on the ground, trying to recover. He knew this had been a warning… and also a demonstration that, even in this strange world, his brother was there—by his side, ready to protect him from everything.
Jay lay face down on the damp earth. The blood, warm and thick, spread from his back like a dark river, trying to carve impossible paths between the roots of the forest. The metallic scent mingled with the cold aroma of the night, and the ground seemed to sink beneath his cheek, slowly swallowing him.
His breathing was weak. Barely a whisper. Barely proof that he was still alive.
He thought, with a mind shattered into pieces:
Is this my end?Is this how my story ends?After finding my brother… after searching for him so long… after promising to protect that little brat I barely even know…?Will this be my final moment? A pathetic, insignificant, absurd ending?No… it can't be, right? … right?
His thoughts clashed against each other like disordered waves. Pain. Fury. Shame. Fear. All feelings mixing together like ink spilled into water.
Darkness began to devour the edges of his vision. The world dimmed slowly, like a bonfire starved of oxygen.
Then he felt something: hands. Firm. Warm. Urgent.
Daru turned him over, laying him on his back with swift yet careful movements, as if handling something fragile he could not afford to lose.
"Jay!" —his voice was tense, more than Jay remembered— "Answer me, Jay! Fight… fight to stay! Hey, stay awake!"
Jay tried to respond, but no voice came. His throat released only broken air, more a groan than a word.
"Jay… listen to me," Daru continued, leaning closer, his ragged breath colliding with the cold air. "I'll help you, alright? I can take you to the village… I can heal you… I can save you… But I need you to stay here with me! Jay! Jay, hey!"
The cries echoed through the forest, bouncing between trunks like desperate reverberations. The wind carried them away, as if trying to hide them among the night's shadows.
But Jay no longer heard the full words. Only fragments. Pieces reaching him distant, distorted, as if from the depths of a dream.
Jay… fight…Jay… stay…Jay… I'll save you…
And even in the midst of agony, of the pain burning his back and the cold numbing his hands, another thought emerged.
Smaller. Stubborn. Human.
No… not yet…I can't fall behind… I can't remain less than him…Someday… someday I'll catch up… no… I'll surpass him…In this life… or any other… it doesn't matter… but not here… not like this…
It was a small desire… but also the brightest spark he carried within.
Darkness wrapped around him slowly. Like a heavy cloak. Like the night closing in from all directions.
The sounds disappeared. The pain faded. The forest dissolved. The moon became a distant point, drowned in blackness.
Jay exhaled one last time.
And fell into the bottomless silence.